The years 2020 and 2021 seems to have whizzed past in a blur of scrambling confusion and mind-numbing waiting.
From talking to a number of people I know, some have successfully transitioned to new work scopes, business markets, even careers in different industries.
Others I know are still figuring their paths forward and not sure what to do next.
I suppose I'm somewhere in between - I've formed a rough plan to go on and I'm exploring avenues and work relationships to bring it to pass.
I'm definitely not a success transition story. Yet.
But I strongly believe that I'll get there.
If you are in a similar situation, I'd be glad to swap stories and learn about what worked for you. If you like, I'd be happy to share what worked for me, too.
I Had an Early, Terrible Experience as an Educator. But it Helped Frame My Thoughts on Future Bad Days.
Early in my career as an educator, I was placed as an assistant trainer to a senior trainer in the company I was working at.
The school we were running the programme in had a reputation.
A good one.
When we entered the school, something felt off. I couldn't quite pinpoint it until we commenced class.
Despite the best efforts of the senior trainer, the students refused to settle down and fights nearly broke out at least twice (among the students).
Even the form teacher of the class, who was sitting in, couldn't exert any control. And we had 4 or 5 lessons with them in total.
Later, I heard similar stories from another trainer (from the same company) who was teaching another class in another location in the school.
For obvious reasons, I cannot disclose the identity of the school. It was, to put it mildly, my worst-ever experience of disciplinary problems in a school.
I've heard since then that the situation in the school had improved over the years, but, as I've never been back there, I cannot confirm or deny the truth of this.
The upshot of this is that every other school seems, in comparison, so much better.
Because I always compare potentially bad experiences to this one, I end up being always thankful even when things go slightly awry.
Framing. Such an important thing.
My First Experience in a Part-Time Job Wasn't Great, But it Helped Me Discover What I Wanted and Didn't Want
Having always been a bit different (some say VERY), I naturally gravitated towards the self-employed/freelance/entrepreneur world.
Once I found it, of course.
My first foray into the working world was as a part-time admin assistant in the F&B department of a local country club. It was a holiday job, just before I started studying in Temasek Polytechnic (Biotechnology!)
The job came through an introduction, so I got it pretty easily. And because there were 6 months between getting my O level results and the start of my polytechnic course, I had plenty of time.
I found soon that I likely wasn't entirely needed, because most of the tasks were straightforward and I finished them in short order, thus ending up with a lot of downtime.
One of the tasks was supposed to take over a week, but I got it done in 2 days.
Unfortunately, being in an office environment at a low ranking job, and partly because I was introduced into it, I couldn't look like I had nothing to do even though I really had nothing to do.
This was extraordinarily hard.
I couldn't sit around reading, and there were no modern mobile phones with ready Internet access. The computers here weren't exactly very fast and there just wasn't that much on the Internet in those days anyway.
Within a couple weeks, I was completely bored. I didn't have the autonomy to spend downtime the way I wanted to, and I didn't have anything challenging or interesting to do.
I left after 2 months to preserve my sanity.
I am thankful to the person who got me the job, because I did learn a number of things, and it gave me a number of stories to tell since then.
It also taught me that I needed to find work that I could pour myself into and that I really couldn't stand tedium.
Also, I'm thankful to the person because I earned enough to go LAN gaming every day for the next 4 months (If you remember when this was a huge thing, you're likely of a similar age to me. :p ) before my poly course started.
Yes, I was a gamer. And through gaming, I learned a lot of very useful principles for designing learning programmes (again, a post for another time).
If I could go back in time, I don't think I would have changed this bit of my past, boring though it was. I feel that it had great formative value.
The Training Industry (at Least in Singapore) is Filled with Fear and Mistrust. We Have to Change That.
I once talked to a few fellow trainers about education and the current ‘landscape’ of training opportunities. One of the things that they brought up resonated deeply with me.
They said that training companies that they work with/for aren’t very open to sharing resources, collaborating with one another, or sharing freelance trainer databases.
I asked them if they, as trainers, are open to these things and they responded with a resounding yes!
As a long-time trainer myself, I cannot help but agree with their assessment.
It felt strange that there was such a disconnection between the attitudes of the trainers and that of the training companies.
But I get it.
The prevailing concern is that of intellectual property "theft". And at least one of the companies I've worked with seems to have a crippling fear of this.
Even after working for so many years with them, readily sharing material I come up with on my own, it still feels as if they don't trust me.
The truth is, in the post-information age, information is so readily available that it's impossible to completely protect your lesson plans and curriculum, unless you ban all recording devices and recording methods, including webinars and online classes.
Further, even if someone else knows what you train, can they deliver it the way you can?
If they can do so easily, maybe your material isn't that good or original to begin with.
In which case, is it really as valuable as you think it is?